Mr In-Between
by gastlyhauntergengar
Summary: The Agency isn't so bad…okay, yeah it is. Besides the fact that you have zero privacy sleeping on the couch in the "living room"/"kitchen," the most unsettling thing about the "office" you live in is pretty much its owner. Phoenix, you find, is kind of a piece of work.


**A/N: **Because Hobo!Nick lightly antagonizing AA4-era Apollo is everything to me.

There will probably be a follow up to this.

* * *

Your landlord tells you he's had enough, after two months. When Kristoph was sent to jail you were sorely out of a job, and what little you hadsaved up had to go towards April's rent plus bills. By June, you could barely call what you were doing in your apartment living anyway; fifty cent ramen, cold water, no phone, and barely any light to keep you company as you spent your days visiting the detention center, seeking desperate takers (there were none). Gratefully filing for unemployment was a success, but the first check hasn't come in time for you not to get kicked out, and the landlord says no more extensions: so here you are.

Taking up residence in the Wright Talent Agency, because now you're the desperate one.

Instead of just offering you a potential case, the much-less-than-anticipated Phoenix Wright has also told you you can crash in the office in lieu of getting paid for "working under him"…it wasn't like you'd told him you were planning on spending your last hundred on a cheap motel, or that at worst you were just gonna live in the car…no, that must've been Trucy, who'd seen said car and then (heroically, against your will) begged her Daddy to let you live with them until you got money.

It was one of the most embarrassing conversations you've ever had in your life, but well, there wasn't any room to sleep in the car next to all of your things anyway.

The Agency isn't so bad…okay, yeah it is. Besides the fact that you have zero privacy sleeping on the couch in the "living room"/"kitchen," the most unsettling thing about the "office" you live in is pretty much its strange owner; Phoenix, you find, is kind of a piece of work.

He's weird, and cryptic, and you can't tell whether or not he's making fun of you every time he speaks, and he laughs at things that aren't funny. He's like a cartoon character who wears the same thing every day (literally you've seen his closet, and all it consists of is sweatshirts varying from gray to navy and gross, black sweatpants). When he doesn't shave for three days, the coarse-but-purposeful stubble starts to look like a borderline-caveman's shadow. Homeless: he always looks homeless.

Plus the way he's set up the office is weird, and so not like an apartment. The "rooms" are barely that, only vaguely marked by too-large furniture and oddly-specific trinkets. The "bedroom" partition is a drywall that he looks like he did himself, and the bathroom has plumbing that he also probably did himself considering how often the toilet breaks (twice already and you've been here three days).

If it weren't for Trucy, whose upbeat company you can't help but immediately enjoy (and whose mannerisms and joyfulness remind you of Clay, who's away and who you miss), you might just rather live in that shitty motel. Or hell, maybe even your car, where all but your necessities are still packed (because you aren't sure you trust Wright not to casually rummage through your stuff)…

…And it's not until you see him coming out of the shower one morning that your wariness towards your living situation starts to change.

You're in the kitchen doing breakfast when he waltzes right out in a towel that's clumsily held together just above his crotch with one hand. Still half-wet, he's bent over and carelessly looking around the "living room" for something, and your eyes go wide and get stuck on the body that he clearly has been hiding well beneath the ugly clothes: clear skin, broad shoulders, weathered muscles, light dusting of coarse hair—man has it been a long time since you've seen a man's body—

Without that ridiculous hat, you can clearly see his face. He's in his thirties (you guess?) but is somehow fresh-faced; his short, clean black hair sticks out and back; his eyes are a fascinating shape; the stubble accentuates a firm jawline, and strong neck; and he sports fuller lips than you realized, always wearing that half-assed smile…

He's attractive.

He turns to face you, when he feels your eyes on him.

"Have you seen my beanie?" he asks.

"Um," you rasp, and damn your chords of steel for creaking when you're flustered. And why is he asking you that?

"Ah," Wright responds to himself, smiling. "Trucy must be hiding it." "Daddy!" you can hear her from the "bedroom," "No more wearing it! It makes you look like you're twelve!"

You duck your head and begin to quickly spoon your way through the rest of your cereal, pointedly not looking up at Nick but still able to see his half-naked figure out of the corner of your eye. He's standing in the middle of the room, sighing, running a hand through his hair, smiling and staring at nothing, lost in absent thought…the towel slipping out of his loose, teasing hand and further down his waist all the while…will he just leave already?

"She made that hat for me when she was nine," Phoenix sees fit to share with you. So? You lean down further to slurp milk from your cereal bowl, hoping it'll make it look like you're too enraptured with your breakfast to be listening. Maybe he's even not talking to you. Maybe he's talking to himself. (What's with attractive old people and their insistence on narrating the nostalgic tales of their youth?)

"She's embarrassed by it now," Nick continues, laughing a little, "which is exactly why I still wear it." You tip the bowl sharply upwards to suck down the rest of the milk, then slam it down way too hard to not sound like you're in a hurry.

He glances over at you curiously because of it.

You make eye contact with him; and he has this way of staring that would make anyone nervous, steady, earnest, bold, wondering. Though, it's hard to stay stuck on his eyes when those wide shoulders and abs catch your eye as a bit of water still trickles down them, and his hipbones protrude and that happy trail leads elsewhere and—

Trucy bursts out of the bedroom, interrupting your gaze's (stupid) slippery slope and you're glad she's snapped you out of it, flustered and quickly moving to put your dishes in the sink. Klavier's not your type, you think as you scrub, but word around the prosecutor's office is he's easy and you could stand to get rid some of this tension…apparently. Trucy is now handing her dad a twill fedora with a bright grin on her face, and he's observing it carelessly in one hand.

"Wear this instead," she says matter-of-factly, "I bought it for you, it's much more business-man-like—maybe it'll make your opponents at the poker table more intimidated!"

He puts it on her head instead, playfully pushing it down over her eyes and ruffling her hair with it as she protests.

Smiling crookedly, he glances at you, as he says to her:

"Thanks. But I think I'm plenty intimidating, sweetheart."

You've realized you can't stoop low enough to sleep with Klavier, although the more he flirts with you, the more tempting it becomes.

Maybe it's the fake tan. Or maybe it's the way that he knows how good-looking he is, and he consciously plays up the whole charming "down-to-earth" rock star thing and everyone wants him because of it. (And you don't wanna be "everyone," or a stereotype…it's just hard for you to admit that a classically good looking golden-boy like him is actually real, like his particular trope of existence is so cheesy that he should notbe real).

It has been over a year, though. The last guy you even kissed was Clay, but at the moment he's out of the country preparing for that historic mission. While your humble best friend (and distant crush) vaguely promised the last time you saw him that you two would wait for each other, it's hard waiting on someone who you know belongs with the stars instead of with you…

So if men who know they're good-looking irritate you, then that should place Nick at the bottom of your want-list.

That, among plenty other reasons.

He hasn't mentioned your slip of the eye at his towel-line the other morning, if he noticed it (and he had to now that you think about it, it wasobvious), of course he hasn't. But, he has teased you about being part of the home…one Saturday he stops by you on the couch (as you're reading old case files) on his way to the Laundromat, wearing one of those t-shirt tank tops with scissor-made arm holes that can barely be considered a full shirt, and basketball shorts that cling to his hard thighs. He looks like one of those douche-y older guys who still plays basketball at the high school, skin bronzed and covered in a light sheen of sweat from the June heat, sticking to curves and crevices all the way down…

And he's still wearing that stupid hat.

"Got any unmentionables that need washing?" he asks you casually.

He's smiling like a smug doofus and he's asking about your underwear and you should not feel yourself flushing against your will.

You purposefully shift the fliers in your hands so they cover your face.

"Not by you, thanks," you blunder too loudly.

Another afternoon: he comes out of his bedroom at noon (just waking up?), shirtless and with his thin sweatpants slung way too low on his hips (and the hat's on his scruffy head once again; does he wear it to bed or something!?) He swipes the box of Cheez-its on the table in front of you, that you bought for yourself (you don't eat their food), and scarfs a couple, but then just stands by and doesn't say anything to you (flaunting his cut torso and faint trails of dark hair, and how does he even look like that? All he seems to do is sleep and play cards, like when does he ever work out?)

You say, to keep your mind (and eyes) off his body:

"I may've found an apartment."

A pause, then: "Oh?"

He either sounds like he doesn't believe you, or like he's just making bored conversation to humor you, and you don't know which you prefer.

"Yup. Should be able to make my down payment on Friday."

"Aw, but you're like part of the family now."

"What?"

You look over, and he stretches and yawns like he never said anything, making a distracting noise that's sexual-not-on purpose; pulls his arms up over his head, effectively making his hips look more jaunting, and accenting the outline of his bulge beneath the thin fabric—your cheeks burn—he's not wearing underwear—

He glances at you, smiling.

"Let me know if you need any help moving your stuff out."

What stuff? you think, grating. It's all in my car, because I don't trust you—

"I'm nowhere near in-shape anymore," he says—liar, you cross-reference angrily—"but I think I'm stronger than I look."

He walks away with your Cheez-its box, and you catch a glimpse of his gorgeous toned back before he slips back into the bedroom, and that's when you think he has to be playing it up.

If that's not in-shape then you don't know what is.

Yet another night, at three in the morning, you're watching TV and drinking cheap vodka on the couch: your paycheck from the Kitakis still wasn't enough to put a down on the apartment you wanted, the seller's giving to someone else, you're pretty depressed, and you're realizing that you've lost control of your life since even since Kristoph left you for the slammer.

Nick comes into the office from wherever it is he plays sketchy underground poker, and stumbles over to invite himself next to you on the couch, half-empty beer bottle of his own already in hand. (He must've been walking the streets with it, and you wonder how that must've looked; it's like the guy likes to look homeless on purpose—)

"Cherry Smirnoff?" He comments from his seat beside you. "Haven't had that since college." He says it demeaningly as if he's some connoisseur and isn't a thirty-one-year-old drinking Keystone—even you don't drink that and you're cheap. "Although, I guess you're about college age, huh? What are you, twenty, twenty-one—"

"I'm twenty two."

"Might help you look older if you grow a beard."

You turn to him—he's gazing at the TV with glazed-over eyes (is he drunk too?) and wearing that agonizingly collected smile—and just blurt it out:

"Wasn't aware I should take grooming tips from the guy who looks like he dumpster-dives for a living."

You regret it for half a second, but he only chuckles at you in response. Then he's looking at you like he's a little impressed.

"Touché," he says, tipping the nose of his beer towards you as if it's a toast.

You turn away from him, sit back, and drink from your bottle instead (and it burns; you clench your eyes shut at the awful taste and must look like a bitch doing it as you swallow)…you really shouldn't be drinking anymore.

…He's still staring at you.

"What're you doing up Mr. Wright?" you ask, slurred, because you can feel your face burning up under the intensity of that look of his.

He pauses before answering, eyes still transfixed on you.

"I had work," he says simply. You can hear the smile in his voice as he adds, "You don't have to call me 'Mr.' You are twenty-two."

You, slightly irritated:

"What would you prefer that I call you?"

Him, completely serious:

"Anything but 'Daddy.'"

Your flush quickly spreads to your neck, a bit of heat swells low in your abdomen.

"...I'll stick to Mr. Wright."

He turns the beer bottle over in his hand as if contemplating it, drawing your attention to the curves of his deft fingers, the veins in his forearm…

Then he speaks to you, and seems to ask, earnestly:

"What are you still doing up?"

There's a slow but steady burning in your chest, as you let his question fester…it makes you feel vulnerable enough to share.

You sigh, tapping your fingers against the glass in your hands, your forehead sweating.

"I didn't get the apartment."

He sighs too, and as you feel his arm fall just behind your head on the back of the couch, you think for a moment that he just might apologize.

"Yeah, I remember this part," he goes with instead, fingers trilling against the cushion. "Just graduated, just took the bar, thinking your degree'll open doors, stumbling from one thing to the next and never feeling like you're ever gonna find your footing. And even when you do find it, it still feels like a farce." He takes another drink, slow and calculated. Then, like he's realizing it for himself as he says it:

"…You never really stop being in this part."

Hm. Some of the ache in your chest eases as his words settle in, and they make you feel slightly less pathetic about your current (sad, lonely) state.

For once, you're grateful for one of his displaced nuggets of wisdom.

"What happened to you?" you ask now, probably inappropriately; but really, it's what's been bothering you ever since you've met the riddle of a man.

What happened to the legendary Phoenix Wright?

And Nick stares at you back very seriously, and almost somberly, for the first time ever. His blue-gray eyes are tired, but there's something still faintly stunning about them, even here in the dark; dull, but like they used to shine brilliantly once…it makes you feel like you really missed out on something, on someone, significant.

But then the pause between you two goes on for too long to be meaningful…and you watch his expression fall lazily flat like you're watching him gradually lose his (intelligent) train of thought. He takes to staring down at your hands instead…which are now fidgeting nervously around the bottle thanks to his eyes on them…

"I should be asking you that," is Phoenix's bored reply. The serious look is gone, replaced again with a vague smile, and the ball of the conversation's back in his court, as if it were ever really in yours. "Two thirds of that Smirnoff is gone." In your drunk-perception, he tantalizingly drags those eyes up and down your body like he's studying it, and it shoots sparks up all your nerves and shit are you horny. He then says,

"You look too small to be able to handle that much at once…"

"I'm fine!"

He looks caught off-guard at your outburst, though only a little. He smiles, and then, in a low, playful voice that agitates the burning in your chest:

"Not so loud, Apollo. We have neighbors."

Your face has gotta be crimson at this point. And you don't even have neighbors, this is an office—

"Alright." You clear your throat clumsily, awkwardly, and shunt the glass bottle down onto the table. "I'm gonna go to bed."

You stand up quickly to make your point. Much drunker than you realized…Dizzy…

…You forget that this is your bed.

"Mine?" Nick sounds dead-serious. And then he gives directions: "Take a left, go down the hall there, and it's the door on your right."

Like his bedroom's not right behind the goddamn couch—

"Mr. Wright I need your coc—couch." You stammer. "The couch, the this, the thing that you're sitting on, please."

He stands up across from you with ease. Maybe he's not as drunk as you thought he was. Maybe he is.

"Sure," he supplies.

You stare distantly but needily at his body in front of you, his wide shoulders, broad chest, that trim waist. He looks like he'd have a strong hold, like being wrapped in those arms at night would be a warm, tight, and comforting fit—when you're this drunk you really like being held until you can fall asleep—

"You're gonna be alright," he says as you shut your eyes tight, and you're not sure if he means tonight or like, eventually…but it doesn't help either way.

"Uh, yeah." You swallow, feeling much too warm all over your body for your own good. "Right."

He smiles, a touch genuine.

"Goodnight, Apollo."

Your hazy eyes open enough to watch as he leans down, takes your bottle of Smirnoff away from your reach, and sees his way out of the room.

He leaves the bedroom door open behind him, and in your stupor you can slightly see into it, even in the dark. You can see the silhouettes of his muscular shoulders, tugging his shirt overhead, slipping off his pants, running his hands through his hair…and suddenly, that grown man's bed, with him in it, feels much farther away than it did a minute ago.

…This is why you don't get drunk anymore.


End file.
